


Jitters from the Brew

by artistocrazy



Series: Aushun Week 2020 [1]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - After College/University, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, Bakery and Coffee Shop, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-06-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:29:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24755548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artistocrazy/pseuds/artistocrazy
Summary: For Aushun Week 2020.Day 2: Crossover/AU.Yeah, I’ll take a Coffee Shop AU with a shot of former Student/Professor dynamic, please (if you can’t tolerate that part, that’s okay - just don’t read it).Context: Former Student/Professor Dynamic. They met during one of Roderich’s first ever adjunct classes - a Music Theory 101 scheduled for 8AM. She was a sophomore on the swim team who had a later start in college. There was an attraction, but nothing ever happened (they didn’t even know it was mutual) because they’re both respectful professionals.
Relationships: Austria & Hungary (Hetalia), Austria/Hungary (Hetalia)
Series: Aushun Week 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790344
Kudos: 6





	Jitters from the Brew

Roderich coughed upon swallowing his Viennese Roast too quickly and hoped it wasn’t too loud. He wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to draw attention to himself just yet, especially when this darn thesis draft needed more of his own time and focus. He just had to catch his breath on seeing whoever it was walk through the door with those long, bouncy curls that lit up like a wheat field in a sunset engulfing whoever was underneath and snap out of remembering that Music Theory GenEd he taught for the second time as an adjunct.

He had to shake it off. He could do that. He was good at that. He was just being ridiculous yet again, because despite all of his exposure to higher education he was still a fool with wants and needs he knew were outside of his wheelhouse. That could be anyone under all of that hair. So this person just so happened to look a little like that one undergrad swimmer he thought was cute in that 8AM he otherwise loathed. 

Okay, the swimmer he thought was very cute. 

Who was always on time, despite clearly just arriving from practice with her hair pulled up in that bun that looked ready to collapse any second. 

The one with inquisitive, green eyes that seemed to stand out from the other side of the room without the use of makeup. 

The one who asked oddly intelligent questions despite having no musical discipline to draw anything from. The one who found time to visit him during office hours to discuss the circle of fifths and debate why tritones might be misunderstood.

Okay, so he was quietly into her and suppressing it like crazy. Were the situation different, he still would have silently pined without the added ick factor of being her teacher. It probably would have ended the same way anyway. Give the guy a break! It was one of his first ever adjunct classes - the students were only a couple years younger than him to begin with, and even then he kept a strictly professional attitude as if decades parted them. 

She was a good student, a very bright girl who earned her A- through her own hard work and merit, and from what he understood she had a reputation among the other swimmers for her integrity. It wasn’t her fault she just so happened to be gorgeous without really trying, and her magnetism had no sway on his grading scale. At the end of the day, Roderich prided himself on fitting his image of what a good educator should be: firm, passionate, and respectful of every student. Erzsébet was no exception.

Besides, Roderich lived and studied and worked in a city with what had to be hundreds of thousands - no, millions of people living in it. It wouldn’t have shocked him if this person happened to have the same hair as her. It wasn’t uncommon. Even if not, he could understand why it would be a popular shade at salons.

But that was a very similar way this person tried to put up that hair to hers. 

And those broader shoulders were familiar, even through the blouse and after dropping those curls back over them. 

And that admittedly generous laugh at accidentally being called “Alphabet” was - _oh good God, it was her!_

That was her, picking up 4 cups of something and maybe the interest Roderich thought he’d snuffed out years ago.

Roderich could feel himself heat up with panic and fluffed out his collar. Oh no, he forgot he dressed down that day. What day could have been worse to wear a hoodie in public? Not that he expected to see anyone he knew, anyway. At lectures, he made it a point to go in wearing slacks and solid button-ups and ties. Hell, it was rare to see him without at least a vest or a nice sweater covering him, for goodness sakes! Most days he came in looking like someone’s finely dressed grandfather! But now? He must have looked like such a slob hunched over his clunky, old laptop sipping on coffee hardly keeping him from dying of embarrassment. 

Maybe she wouldn’t recognize him this way. Maybe she’d walk out of the coffee shop without noticing him and out of his life forever, to be left with all of his what-ifs. That would save him some embarrassment, at the very least. He could live with that... right?

“Professor E? Is that you?”

Erzsébet’s voice jolted him back into reality and he crossed his leg somewhat awkwardly before trying to behave as he would with any other student. Masking his nerves as confusion, he finally found it in him to speak. “... Do I know you?”

“Hang on, maybe this will help.” She put her coffee holder down on his table and pulled up her loose hair.

This was maybe the one point in his life where he considered being an actor, because the pleasant surprise seemed to land believably enough for the pair to share a smile. “Oh, Gott im Himmel, Miss Erzsébet! If you will forgive me. I’m a little surprised to see you outside of class.”

“Why?” she shrugged. “I graduated 2 years ago.”

“Has it been that long? Hmm, I suppose I thought you were younger,” he mused, swishing his to-go cup while leaning back in his seat and doing some mental math. “Wait, so were you a junior then? Rather odd time to be taking a GenEd.”

“No, I was a sophomore, but I was 21 at the time. I had a late start to university.”

Roderich felt some of his tension ease, considering that meant their age gap really wasn’t as large as he thought. Not very large at all. Regardless, he kept his cool and kept up the small talk, allowing his mouth to tick up. “Huh. I _thought_ your attitude seemed a little mature for a sophomore.”

“Well, I was gonna say,” she countered, placing her hands in the chair across from him and leaning over it in a teasing way. “You seemed a little young to be a professor. Speaking of, what are _you_ doing outside of class, Dr. E?”

Registering the comment and enjoying the banter, Roderich hummed in good humor and let that tick branch out into a smile. “Still very perceptive, I see; however, I was _never_ Dr. E. It’s just Mr. E right now, so long as I never actually finish my papers. A few more years of writing and study, though, and I should have my doctorate.”

“Mr. E,” she repeated back, letting the name settle on her tongue for a moment and glancing briefly over him again in what one could call his civvies. “I think I like the sound of that better.”

There was something in her tone and in how she said that which gave Roderich a little more courage. “Ah, are you in a hurry?” he asked, gesturing towards the chair across from him. “You’re welcome to sit, if you would like. I’m happy to treat you to a... pastry or something,” he offered, changing tactics upon noticing all of the caffeine sitting in one place. “It’s not everyday you run into a former student outside of campus.”

“I would love to, but I’m on a coffee run for my bosses,” she answered back, her posture slumped a little to amplify her upset while gathering her things.

The question came out without a second thought. “And there is not one for you?”

Erzsébet paused in her tracks before circling back, not noticing the blush on her face. “Well, no.”

Quietly judging her employers, Roderich rolled his eyes and shook his head and offered her the other Viennese Roast he had with him. Ever since he started grad school, he always had the nasty habit of getting two, rather than getting a larger size. Something about portion control with caffeine to keep his hands from shaking while conducting. “Please. I have an extra. Untouched, if that matters.”

Part of the reason Erzsébet had any suspicion the man in the hoodie was her Music Theory professor was the two cups, placed beside each other with the two mouth holes turned in to the other. It was how he started every morning and how he kept them together throughout his lectures. She innocently observed it, trying not to sound too creepy bringing up that little tidbit of her memory. “But that one’s yours, isn’t it?”

Roderich gave her a tired but flattered look from over his glasses before responding dryly. “Think of it as you helping me curb my caffeine addiction.”

“Tsk, tsk. So you hand it off to an impressionable young student,” Erzsébet sassed him while observing the cup.

“Please, I’m not your teacher anymore. Haven’t been so for some time,” Roderich waved his hand dismissively, but obliged her with a quiet chuckle. “Besides, it seems rather silly to have you address me so formally. At least, before I’ve earned my doctorate.”

“Okay,” she tried to hold herself back from playing with her hair while observing the cup in her hands, looking for the barista’s scribbled guess at his name. “so... Roderich?”

That calm smile on his face while he nodded was pleasantly disarming. So disarming she absentmindedly tucked away a few curls behind her ear. 

“Huh,” she mused. “I guess you’re a regular here, then. Okay. Roderich....” 

She pushed the informality a little further upon noticing that calm, regal glow in his eyes. It came out sweetly, with a playful, toothy grin on the uptick of the ending. “Roddy?”

He let out a small chuckle before returning effortlessly to the stone face she remembered seeing during lectures - well, with the exception of that subtle curve of the corner of his mouth. “No. _Just_ Roderich, thank you.”

“I’m not shocked,” Erzsébet relented. “You seem like the kind of guy who wouldn’t stand for the mistake more than once.”

Before he could think she’d turn to go back to her life and leave him with any doubts of it, Erzsébet peered down confidently at him with a hand on her hip and made him thankful he didn’t have to be forward. “Anyway, since you’re _not_ my teacher anymore, Just Roderich, I’d love to catch up with you on the past 4 years at some point soon. Hang on,” she reached into her purse to pull out her phone. “Let me give you my number - we can set something up.”

She left very little room for doubt. And perhaps even less for objection, though who was he to deny a former student the chance to catch up - especially one who was such a pleasure to teach at 8AM? 

“I’d like that fine, thank you,” Roderich nodded politely while pulling out his own. “Feel free to reach out when you have a moment. I don’t want to get you into any trouble.”

“Don’t worry - I won’t forget,” she waved it off, switching off her phone and plugging in her contact information. “I’ll let you get back to that paper, in the meantime. I didn’t mean to distract you.”

“Oh, it’s not a problem,” he assured her, trading back her phone once he finally had his name down correctly. “Sometimes it helps to have a distraction every now and then. It gives the mind some time to refresh. I’m inclined to think this was a good one to have, anyway.”

Erzsébet tucked her chin down for a second, overcome by a sweet smile that seemed to bubble over into that little “me too” she gushed out, before switching focus back to her coffee run. “Anyway, I hope it helps. I’ll text you later, okay?”

“I look forward to it.”

“Great! It was good to see you again!”

“Likewise, Miss Erzsébet. Always a pleasure.”

Before she left, she called out from over her shoulder. “Just Erzsi is fine, okay?”

With a head nod, Roderich raised his coffee cup in affirmation. As she left his sight, he looked back down at his phone - still in shock to have her number, in shock at the whole exchange. Placing it back in his pocket, he took another sip of coffee and absentmindedly swirled those bits of sugar sitting at the bottom. “Hmph. Erzsi...”


End file.
